The present invention relates to a side vehicle-body structure of a vehicle, and in particular, relates to the side vehicle-body structure of the vehicle which comprises a hinge bracket to attach a door hinge to a hinge pillar reinforcement.
Conventionally, a hinge pillar and a front pillar which interconnect, in a vertical direction, a front end portion of a roof side rail extending in a longitudinal direction (a side end portion of a front header) and a front end portion of a side sill extending in the longitudinal direction are provided at a side portion of a vehicle body. The front pillar is provided to be continuous to an upper end of the hinge pillar. Since the hinge pillar forms a front-side portion of a periphery of an ingress/egress opening for passengers, a pair of upper-and-lower door hinges which support a front door so that the front door can open or close the ingress/egress opening for passengers are attached to a hinge pillar reinforcement.
The hinge pillar is provided to face a front wheel in the longitudinal direction. Therefore, since the front wheel retreats (moves rearward) when receiving a collision load in a vehicle frontal collision, there is a situation where the collision load is directly transmitted to the vehicle body via the front wheel with no impact reduction. In a small overlap collision (hereafter, referred to as a “SOL collision”), since a collision object and a front side frame do not overlap each other, there is a concern that when the retreating front wheel interferes with the hinge pillar, the collision load inputted from the front wheel may cause deformation of a vehicle compartment's space around passengers, such as the hinge pillar. In particular, in a case in which a sufficient vehicle-width is required from vehicle designing, the hinge pillar is located at a more outward position of the vehicle than usual, so that the front wheel tends to interfere with the hinge pillar highly possibly. Accordingly, some technologies of preventing such deformation of the vehicle compartment's space caused by the collision load inputted from the front wheel have been proposed.
A side vehicle-body structure of a vehicle disclosed in Japanese Patent Laid-Open Publication No. 2013-141928 comprises a hinge pillar including a pillar outer panel having a front wall face and a pillar inner panel which form a closed cross section extending vertically, a hinge pillar reinforcement provided in the above-described closed cross section and including a slant face, and a guide means for guiding the front wheel rearward and outward in a vehicle collision. Herein, the guide means is configured such that a cross angle between the slant face and its side wall face is set to be smaller than a cross angle between the front wall face and the side wall face. Thereby, the front wheel can be guided from an inward side to an outward side in the vehicle width direction in the SOL collision, so that the collision load can be directed (i.e., released) outward in the vehicle width direction.
The above-described side vehicle-body structure of the vehicle of the patent document is configured to make the front wheel slide outward in the vehicle width direction along the guide means, so that the amount (degree) of deformation of the hinge pillar caused by the interference with the front wheel can be properly reduced. However, according to this side vehicle-body structure of the vehicle, since the slant face of the guide means integrally formed at the hinge pillar reinforcement is provided with a guide function of the retreating front wheel, the hinge pillar reinforcement itself including the slant face is required to have a strength that is high enough to bear the collision load, so that there is a concern that the gross weight of the hinge pillar reinforcement may increase improperly.